


Hyacinth Blue

by Mira



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-02-09
Updated: 2009-02-09
Packaged: 2017-10-15 13:53:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/161471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mira/pseuds/Mira
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Teyla never told them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hyacinth Blue

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Pic for 1000](http://community.livejournal.com/picfor1000/) LJ community

Teyla never told them.

Not when they returned, because there was too much to do, too much going on, and too many strangers among them. Ronon broached the subject with her once, but never again.

He'd been with her when they'd come, the Ancients; he'd wanted to go with her, but they wanted only her. She'd left him standing on the far side of the stargate, angry and frustrated.

How strange it had been to walk through the gate into Atlantis without John at her side, without Rodney's grumbling observations, without Ronon's sturdy presence. How silent Atlantis was without her friends waiting for her in the gate room, only Captain Helia looking sternly at her.

"Greetings, Captain," Teyla had said. Helia continued to observe her. "How may I be of service?"

Helia stood as straight as Teyla, her golden hair falling in ringlets around her shoulders, her hands folded in front of her. Teyla thought she looked like the images of _angels_ that Elizabeth had shown her from Earth, but like an _angel_ with, as John would have said, a stick up its ass. She smiled at that thought.

Helia said, "I understand that you worked closely with the people from Earth."

"Yes." After a pause, Teyla added, "I consider them dear friends. Family."

"Ah." Helia turned, and gestured. "Would you --"

They walked side by side through the broad corridor ringing this segment of Atlantis. Light streamed through the windows, and she realized they'd opened every window. She hadn't realized that was possible. Perhaps they were airing out Atlantis, the way she did her tent after a heavy rain.

Helia led Teyla to what she knew to be the hologram room. John had showed it and the hologram to her in their early days in Atlantis. Helia gestured to the podium. Teyla hesitated, then stepped onto it. Nothing happened.

"As I thought," Helia said, studying Teyla. As if, Teyla thought, she were a species unknown to Helia. She raised her head proudly.

Helia motioned for her to move and then she stepped on the podium. At once, a woman dressed in white robes appeared. "This is the great city of Atlantis," she said.

Teyla spoke over the hologram. "I have heard this, several times."

Helia ignored her. Teyla sighed and listened as the hologram continued. "In time, a thousand worlds bore the fruit of life in this form. Then one day our people stepped foot upon a dark world where a terrible enemy slept. Never before had we encountered beings with powers that rivaled our own. In our over-confidence, we were unprepared and outnumbered."

"That is not true," Teyla said loudly. She was growing irritated with Helia, with the Ancients, with their lies. "You did not stumble upon your enemies; you created them." Helia stepped off the platform; the hologram disappeared abruptly. "You created them," Teyla repeated. She stared back at Helia who, for the first time, appeared nonplused.

"What do you know of these things?" Helia finally said. "You are --"

"Be silent, Helia," the hologram said. The room and corridors blanked into darkness; only the hologram was visible, the glow from her reflected on Helia's and Teyla's faces.

Teyla caught her breath and stepped back a pace. "Ancestors," she whispered.

The transparent woman studied Helia, her face impassive, body language unreadable. Then she turned her gaze on Teyla. "Go, child," she said quietly. One corridor began to glow a cool blue, the color of the wild hyacinths Teyla had hunted in the hidden valleys of her childhood. She started toward the opening.

"Teyla Emmagan, daughter of Athos," the hologram called. She held one hand palm out toward Helia, who stared up at her, something like terror on her face, but the other hand she stretched toward Teyla, fingers relaxed, palm up. "Heart-sister to my own child, John Sheppard. Know this: the end is not yet. I say to you again: _the end is not yet_. Families will be reunited, loved ones rejoined. Hold hope in your heart, my child.

"Now, go. Return when the sign is given. You will know this sign to be sent by me." She turned her face back to Helia. Teyla hesitated, and then fled down the corridor.

Ahead of her, the corridor glowed. All sunlight had vanished, as had the other Ancients -- no, she told herself, they are _Alterrans_. The woman who had spoken to her so kindly was an Ancient, but not Helia, not her people.

The glow led her down another corridor, and then another, until ahead of her she saw doors with the familiar stained glass insets. The darkness and lighting had disoriented her so she was surprised to find herself in the jumper bay. She stopped. She could not fly a jumper. She turned to find the stargate, but the corridor was dark again. Only the jumper bay glowed blue.

She looked around. One jumper's hatch was open, its interior the same hyacinth blue. She approached it cautiously. "Hello?" she called, but no one answered. When she stepped on the hatch and peered in, no one was there. She looked back but now the entire bay was in darkness and only the jumper lit by the eerie glow. Reluctantly, she entered the jumper and took the passenger's seat.

The hatch closed, a soft whine, and the bay's enormous doors retracted. "Oh," she whispered, and clutched at the seat. The jumper flew itself. She watched as the stargate engaged, illuminating the control room hyacinthine blue, not its usual color at all. The room was entirely empty.

The jumper left Atlantis, through the ductile conduit through space, and suddenly she was home. Her comrade Ronon had waited, silent as the hatch released her.

Teyla never told them.

  



End file.
